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Im Rahmen dieser Reihe und unseres Jahresthemas Das Politische Mandat der Künste, veranstaltet das Thomas Mann House und das Wende Museum gemeinsam die Podiumsdiskussion Kunst zwischen den Kulturen über die sich verändernden Perspektiven auf den Westen durch die Linse der bildenden Kunst. Am 22. Januar werden die Künstlerin Phung Huynh, die im Alter von einem Jahr aus Vietnam in die Vereinigten Staaten emigrierte und die Kuratorin Asha Bukojemsky, die als Kind ukrainischer Eltern zwischen Kanada und den Vereinigten Staaten aufgewachsen ist, über das Leben, Arbeiten, Schaffen und den Bau von Brücken zwischen den Kulturen sprechen. Moderiert wird die Diskussion von Joes Segal, dem Chefkurator und Programmdirektor des Wende Museums.

Die Serie geht hervor aus einer Kooperation der Universität Münster und der Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung (München) mit dem Wende Museum (Culver City) und dem Thomas Mann House (Los Angeles). Die Reihe wird über einen Blog kommuniziert, der verschiedene Aspekte und Erkenntnisse des Programms für ein internationales Publikum aufbereitet. Um eine möglichst große Vielfalt an Positionen und Perspektiven zu erreichen, werden die beteiligten Institutionen Einzelveranstaltungen durchführen. Die Veranstaltungen finden an den jeweiligen Standorten in Münster, München und Los Angeles statt.

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The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, college and university students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

The guest speaker for the opening program of the new series is artist David Horvitz, who uses art books, photography, performance art, and mail art as media for his work. He is known for his work in the virtual sphere, and is part of the Wende Museum’s current exhibition For Ruth, The Sky in Los Angeles: Ruth Wolf-Rehfeldt and David Horvitz. His work has been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the New Museum, New York, the Tate Modern, London, and the Art Metropole, Toronto, among many others.

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Join the Goethe-Institut Chicago and Northwestern University for a series of talks about Thomas Mann’s advocacy of democracy during the Nazi period, held on the occasion of the exhibition 'Thomas Mann: Democracy Will Win,' currently on view at the University Library.

The exhibition commemorates the series of lecture tours that the Nobel Laureate conducted throughout the Unites States from the late 1930s to the mid-1940s. The first of these tours began at Northwestern University, where more than 4000 people came to hear him speak about the fundamental reasons for liberal democracy. “It is a terrible spectacle when the irrational becomes popular,” Mann said in a speech at the Library of Congress in 1943, and he drew on his considerable powers of thought and expression to counter the sources of this spectacle through his confident motto: “Democracy will win.”

The like-named exhibit, located on the ground floor of the University Library, is divided into two parts: the first charts the changes in Mann’s political views, while the second connects Mann’s lectures tours to current political situations in both Europe and the United States.

The library and the exhibit is open to the public Monday – Saturday, 8am – 6pm with photo ID.

*Diese Ausstellung wurde auf englischer Sprache konzipiert*

Frieze Projects: Against the Edge creates multiple parallels between the political and social practices of the Moroccan-born French artist Nicola L. and German author Thomas Mann. Spread throughout the living room and study of Thomas Mann’s home in Pacific Palisades, Nicola L.’s functional sculptures and Penetrables reveal a profound purpose while joshing with the legacy of modernist architecture.

For Both Nicola L. and Thomas Mann, the home was political. It was from his study that Mann would complete his novel Doctor Faustus as well as record his monthly anti-Nazi messages to the German people, broadcast by the BBC to Germany. Nicola, upon returning home to Paris in 1967, took to the streets with students and factory workers in the May 68 demonstrations, making a series of Penetrable protest banners. These banners were punctuated with entries for five to ten heads, with slogans such as WE WANT TO TOUCH, WE WANT TO SEE, WE WANT TO FEEL, WE WANT TO LOVE, and WE WANT TO BE LOVED stenciled across them. On view at the Thomas Mann House is an example of one of these banners with nine head-Penetrables and the phrase NOUS VOULONS ENTENDRE, or, WE WANT TO HEAR, this work resounds with Mann’s broadcasts, each of which began with the words “Germans, Listen!”

In addition to the exhibition at the Thomas Mann House, the Frieze Projects: Against the Edge also includes installations by Tony Cokes at Beyond Baroque in Venice, Kelly Akashi at the Villa Aurora in Pacific Palisades, and Julie Becker at Del Vaz Projects in Santa Monica.

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Alice Haster’s autobiographical book Was weiße Menschen nicht über Rassismus hören wollen, ''What White People Don't Want to Hear About Racism,'' published by Hanser Verlag, interrogates the structural racism which is present in German society and permeates every aspect of private life. The entrenchment of racism in social structures is often invisible to white subjects but has profound effects on BIPoC, who must contend with cultural intolerance, discrimination, and the pressure to assimilate on a daily basis. Racism does not merely belong to the right-wing fringes of society.

This discussion will explore Black feminism in a transatlantic context, examining the lived experience of Black women in the USA and Europe, including the commonalities and differences, as well as constructing ways of overturning structures of racism and oppression.

Alice Hasters is a journalist, author, and podcaster. She studied at the German School of Journalism in Munich and after graduating worked for the »Tagesschau« and Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg, among others. Since 2016, Hasters has been producing the podcast »Feuer & Brot« (tr: Fire & Bread) about politics and pop culture together with Maximiliane Häcke. In her publications, she deals with the topics of Afro-German identity, racism, and intersectionality. Hasters was named culture journalist of the year in 2020 by medium magazine. She is the author of Was weiße Menschen nicht über Rassismus hören wollen, published by Hanser Verlag, and is currently a 2023 Fellow at the Thomas Mann House Los Angeles.

Morgan Jerkins is the author of the New York Times bestseller This Will Be My Undoing as well as the critically acclaimed books, Wandering In Strange Lands and Caul Baby. She holds a Bachelor’s in Comparative Literature from Princeton University and an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars. A Forbes 30 Under 30 Leader in Media alumna and ASME Next award-winning journalist, Jerkins has been an editor at Medium, ESPN, and New York Magazine, among others. Her short-form work has been published in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, ELLE, Vogue, and The Atlantic, among many other publications. She’s held professorships at Pacific University, Leipzig University in Germany, Columbia University, and the New School. She’s currently based in Harlem.

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Under the self-designation as Black, Alice Hasters writes and publishes in particular about Afro-German identity, racism, feminism and intersectionality, and in 2019 she published her autobiographical debut book What white people don’t want to hear about racism, but should know. Hasters was named cultural journalist of the year 2020 by Medium Magazine.

Alice Hasters is a journalist, author, and podcaster. She studied at the German School of Journalism in Munich and after graduating worked for the »Tagesschau« and Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg, among others. Since 2016, Hasters has been producing the podcast »Feuer & Brot« (tr: Fire & Bread) about politics and pop culture together with Maximiliane Häcke. In her publications, she deals with the topics of Afro-German identity, racism, and intersectionality. Hasters was named culture journalist of the year in 2020 by medium magazine. She is the author of Was weiße Menschen nicht über Rassismus hören wollen, published by Hanser Verlag, and is currently a 2023 Fellow at the Thomas Mann House Los Angeles.

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Who dances and how, what we see as culturally and artistically relevant, is strongly influenced by racism – an assumption Alice Hasters is researching in her fellowship at the Thomas Mann House in LA. The notion that "Black people can dance, white people can't" is particularly strong in multi-ethnic societies. In Western societies, dance seems to be something that is incompatible with power. The rich, the white, the male, the heterosexual, the old - they don't dance - unless they have a stage or are not sober.

This conversation will explore some of the following questions:
To what extent does dance as a lived or as a non-lived practice shape black, white and other identities? Can dance be an instrument to dismantle and challenge positions of power? What does diversity in dance really mean? Is dance universal –can everybody dance? Or is dance an expression of your own specific identity?

Alice Hasters is a journalist, author, and podcaster. She studied at the German School of Journalism in Munich and after graduating worked for the »Tagesschau« and Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg, among others. Since 2016, Hasters has been producing the podcast »Feuer & Brot« (tr: Fire & Bread) about politics and pop culture together with Maximiliane Häcke. In her publications, she deals with the topics of Afro-German identity, racism, and intersectionality. Hasters was named culture journalist of the year in 2020 by medium magazine. She is the author of Was weiße Menschen nicht über Rassismus hören wollen, published by Hanser Verlag, and is currently a 2023 Fellow at the Thomas Mann House Los Angeles.

Kurt A. Douglas is Associate Professor of Dance at Boston Conservatory. Originally from Guyana, South America, Douglas earned a B.F.A. in dance from Boston Conservatory and an M.F.A. in dance from Hollins University. After graduating from the Conservatory, Kurt joined the Limón Dance Company, where he performed in many of Limón’s most influential works. Kurt Douglas joined the Boston Conservatory at Berklee faculty in 2015 where he is an instructor of technique, repertory, critical theory, and pedagogy for modern dance.

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The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

The guest speaker for the second episode of the series is Berlin-based German rapper of Kurdish descent Ebow (real name Ebru Düzgün). She first attracted attention through guerrilla performances in laundromats, supermarkets and on streetcars. Today, Ebow performs on more conventional stages, but her message remains provocative and political. Solo, but also as a member of the Berlin-based music collective Gaddafi Gals, she raps against sexism, racism, and homophobia, for an open, caring, and equal society. Ebow is currently a 2023 Villa Aurora Fellow in Los Angeles.

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About the Documentary BECOMING BLACK

A white couple in the GDR of the 1960s explains to their Black daughter that her skin color is pure coincidence and has no meaning. This is also what the girl likes to believe until, by chance, she discovers the truth at the age of 12.

The child is filmmaker Ines Johnson-Spain.

Long after meeting her biological father's family in Togo, she now, in the role of protagonist and author, reconstructs her family history in the film BECOMING BLACK.

In emotional and open conversations with her stepfather, the atmosphere of silence and repression gets impressively palpable. Slowly it becomes clear how the social environment allowed such a serious denial of facts. The private is political. While exploring her own identity, Ines Johnson-Spain unveils the big taboo that overshadowed her whole childhood, revealing the structural racism in the GDR. In connection with the touching meeting with her late-found Togolese family, the film reflects on identity, family concepts, and social norms. From the 1960s in East Berlin to the present, previously unwritten German history unfolds in this intimate and touching self-portrait.

Germany, 2019, 91 Minutes, digital projection. In German/French with English subtitles. Writer-Director: Ines Johnson-Spain, Director of Photography: Sebastian Winkels, Anne Misselwitz, Editor: Yana Höhnerbach, Executive Producers: Katrin Sandmann, Stefan Matthieu, Producer: Anahita Nazemi.
Production Company: Kobalt Documentary in co-production with Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen (ZDF) (Das kleine Fernsehspiel).

Nora Bernard is an Associate for the Global Media Makers program. Previously she has worked in several operations roles for SXSW and the Telluride, Sundance and New York Film Festivals. Currently, she is an Associate Programmer for the Tribeca Festival in the US Narrative Competition category and Telluride Mountainfilm, a documentary festival that specializes in presenting films that focus on activism, environmental preservation, adventure sports, and cultural exchanges. She also has served on committees for Fantastic Fest, UrbanWorld, IndieMemphis, and the Starz #TakeTheLead Writers’ Intensive.

Alice Hasters is a journalist, author, and podcaster. She studied at the German School of Journalism in Munich and after graduating worked for the »Tagesschau« and Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg, among others. Since 2016, Hasters has been producing the podcast »Feuer & Brot« (tr: Fire & Bread) about politics and pop culture together with Maximiliane Häcke. In her publications, she deals with the topics of Afro-German identity, racism, and intersectionality. Hasters was named culture journalist of the year in 2020 by medium magazine. She is the author of Was weiße Menschen nicht über Rassismus hören wollen, published by Hanser Verlag, and is currently a 2023 Fellow at the Thomas Mann House Los Angeles.

Ines Johnson-Spain, born and raised in the GDR (*1962), studied religious studies at the Free University of Berlin and liberal arts and film history as a guest at the Berlin University of the Arts. She works as a director and screenwriter. She is particularly interested in self-concepts in the field of tension between the individual and society. In the current film BECOMING BLACK she autobiographically dealt with her German/Togolese origin. She is currently a fellow at Villa Aurora.

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An intense dispute is raging on both sides of the Atlantic about whether rich people should make a greater contribution to financing the welfare state and, if so, how this could be done. The debate reflects a profound sense of dissatisfaction in both the USA and the EU. The general feeling is that inequality is on the rise and that, in many cases, the rich pay hardly any tax. How can policymakers respond to this? And what kind of (joint) approach could be used to ensure greater participation by the rich?

It seems that the state of Massachusetts has found a way: in last year’s midterm election on November 8, Massachusetts voters approved the so-called millionaire’s tax which would apply a 4 percent surtax to annual income over $1 million, potentially reducing economic and racial inequality.
This panel brings together two economic experts to discuss the implications of taxing the rich in a transatlantic context: Felix Rohrbeck, Economic Journalist and Evan Horowitz, executive director of Tufts University’s Center for State Policy Analysis (cSPA) which issued a non-partisan report on the millionaires tax.

Felix Rohrbeck currently a fellow at the Thomas Mann House, is a business journalist. He has received many awards for his investigative research, elaborate reporting and cross-media stories. Between 2014 and 2019, he edited the economics desk at DIE ZEIT, the largest weekly newspaper in Germany with over two million readers. In this capacity he was involved in exposing the cum-ex scandal, the biggest tax robbery in Europe. Since 2020, Felix Rohrbeck is co-founder and editor-in-chief of media-startup Flip. As a 2023 fellow at the Thomas Mann House, he explores what a heavier taxation for the exceptionally wealthy, which is currently being debated both in the USA and in Europe, could look like. To put it very simple, the question at the center of his project is: How to tax the rich?

Evan Horowitz, executive director of Tufts University’s Center for State Policy Analysis (cSPA) has led the center since its launch in early 2020.
He had been the "Quick Study" columnist for the Boston Globe, using data to tell stories about policy issues affecting Massachusetts and the nation as a whole. He also contributed data-heavy stories for FiveThirtyEight, NBC's Think, and the Washington Post, and briefly served as fill-in host for WBUR's Radio Boston.
Evan has worked at several Massachusetts think tanks, one focused on equitable economic outcomes and another dedicated to improving long-term thinking in capital markets.
In the bygone past, Evan was a professor of English Literature, with stints at Stanford, Harvard, Brandeis, Princeton, and the University of North Texas. He also attended the Cordon Bleu, where he learned a set of French cooking techniques that he now uses to keep his family happy at dinnertime.

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In her lecture at UCLA, Hasters will address the central assumption that frames Black German life today: the perception that Black people are "new" to Germany. This assumption erases the fact that Black people have lived in German-speaking lands for hundreds of years. As she shows, it also allows anti-Black racism and its history to be falsely viewed as only an American or Western problem with no relation to the German context. Examining the dynamics that unfold from this skewed understanding, Hasters argues that attending to the history of anti-Black racism in Germany enables a deeper understanding of German identity, racism, and antisemitism today.

Alice Hasters is a journalist, author, and podcaster. She studied at the German School of Journalism in Munich and after graduating worked for the »Tagesschau« and Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg, among others. Since 2016, Hasters has been producing the podcast »Feuer & Brot« (tr: Fire & Bread) about politics and pop culture together with Maximiliane Häcke. In her publications, she deals with the topics of Afro-German identity, racism, and intersectionality. Hasters was named culture journalist of the year in 2020 by medium magazine. She is the author of Was weiße Menschen nicht über Rassismus hören wollen, published by Hanser Verlag, and is currently a 2023 Fellow at the Thomas Mann House Los Angeles.

The CumEx-Files is an investigation by a number of European news media outlets into a tax fraud scheme discovered by them in 2017. A network of banks, stock traders, and lawyers had obtained billions from European treasuries through suspected fraud and speculation. How could bankers, lawyers and investors steal 55 billion Euro of taxpayers money in Europe? And what was the role of American banks, including Morgan Stanley and the Bank of America? Oliver Schröm and Felix Rohrbeck were part of an international team of journalists that exposed the cum-ex scandal. The two journalists Oliver Schröm and 2023 Thomas Mann Fellow Felix Rohrbeck will provide insights into their award-winning investigation in the living room of the Thomas Mann House.

Felix Rohrbeck, currently a fellow at the Thomas Mann House, is a business journalist. He has received many awards for his investigative research, elaborate reporting and cross-media stories. Between 2014 and 2019, he edited the economics desk at DIE ZEIT, the largest weekly newspaper in Germany with over two million readers. In this capacity he was involved in exposing the cum-ex scandal, the biggest tax robbery in Europe. Since 2020, Felix Rohrbeck is co-founder and editor-in-chief of media-startup Flip. As a 2023 fellow at the Thomas Mann House, he explores what a heavier taxation for the exceptionally wealthy, which is currently being debated both in the USA and in Europe, could look like.

Oliver Schröm is one of Germany's acknowledged investigative journalists. He was the founder and head of the Investigative Reporting Team at the Stern magazine. Since 2019, he works for the public broadcasting company ARD/NDR and especially for Panorama, the oldest investigative news show on German television. Since November 2011 he is the chairman of the German association of investigative journalists, Netzwerk Recherche. During his career as an investigative reporter, Schröm has worked on several scoops and investigative stories. Together with Oliver Hollenstein, Schröm is the author of the critically acclaimed 2022 book Die Akte Scholz: Der Kanzler, das Geld und die Macht ("The Scholz File: The Chancellor, Money and Power").

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The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

2023 Thomas Mann Fellow Ghayath Almadhoun is a Palestinian poet born in Damascus, Syria. Ghayath emigrated to Sweden in 2008 and currently lives in Berlin. He published four poetry collections in Arabic, which were translated into dozens of languages. Ghayath Almadhoun collaborated with other poets and artists, and his poetry has been part of the work of US artist Jenny Holze, German musician Blixa Bargeld, and others. His latest collection Adrenalin, published in English by Action Books in 2017, was among Small Press Distribution's Poetry Bestsellers in the US and was nominated for the 2018 Best Translated Book Award. His selected poems Ein Raubtier namens Mittelmeer (A Predator called the Mediterranean), published by the Arche Verlag in 2018, ranked top of the LitProm-Bestseller list in 2018 as best book translated into German.

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The century stretching from the end of World War I to the present has seen an explosion in mobility and migration. The post-World War I order—persistent outbreaks of violence, and shifting European and Middle Eastern borders and boundaries—created what Hannah Arendt called “the problem of the stateless people.” The rise of the Nazis and other fascist movements in the 1930s led to a groundswell of emigrants and exiles, and both the Nazis’ genocidal war and post-World War II upheavals and persecutions further exacerbated the crises. In the past decade, the number of forcibly displaced persons has exceeded those of the years around World War II. If the European migrant crisis has served as the main sounding board for current discourses around migration, it is far from the only epicenter of global migration.

What can the history of forced displacement teach us about the current moment? How, in turn, does a history of the present alter our understanding of the past? And given the persistence of the problem of statelessness, is “crisis” the best framework to speak of migrants and refugees? Indeed the multidirectional patterns of so-called economic migration, too, intersect with the histories of imperialism, nationalism, and fascism in often-unpredictable ways, putting pressure on prevailing notions of “forced” versus “voluntary” displacement.

With a broad historical and geographic lens, the Exile and Resistance lecture series examines the overlapping trajectories of exile, migration, and statelessness over the last century, shedding light on experiences and representations of displacement, loss, and persecution and highlighting sites of political and cultural resistance. The series will bring together scholars, artists, and activists for ongoing interdisciplinary presentations and discussions around recent research, films/ documentaries, and artistic pieces that focus on the subjects of exile and resistance in historical as well as contemporary contexts and in a multitude of geographical regions.

Inspired by USC Libraries’ exile studies collections, which include the papers of German-Jewish novelist Lion Feuchtwanger, Exile and Resistance is the result of a joint partnership between USC Libraries, USC Max Kade Institute for Austrian–German–Swiss Studies, and USC Dornsife Department of French and Italian.

Ghayath Almadhoun is a Palestinian poet born in Damascus, Syria, and emigrated to Sweden in 2008. Now he lives in Berlin. He has published four poetry collections in Arabic and his work has been translated into dozens of languages. Ghayath Almadhoun collaborated with other poets and artists and his poetry has been part of work by US artist Jenny Holzer and German musician Blixa Bargeld, and others. His latest collection Adrenalin, published in English by Action Books 2017, was among SPD Poetry Bestsellers in the US, and was nominated for the 2018 Best Translated Book Award. His selected poems Ein Raubtier namens Mittelmeer (Predator called the Mediterranean), Arche Verlag, 2018, ranked top of the Litprom-Bestenliste 2018 of best books translated into German.

Lan Duong is Associate Professor in Cinema & Media Studies at the University of Southern California. She is the author of Treacherous Subjects: Gender, Culture, and Trans-Vietnamese Feminism (Temple University Press, 2012). Dr. Duong’s second book project, Transnational Vietnamese Cinemas and the Archives of Memory, examines Vietnamese cinema from its inception to the present day. Her research interests include feminist film theory, postcolonial literature, and Asian/American film and literature. She has coedited an award-winning anthology called Southeast Asian Women in the Diaspora: Troubling Borders in Literature and Art (University of Washington Press, 2013). Duong is a Founding Member of the Critical Refugee Studies Collective. She currently serves as the website editor for the group (www.criticalrefugeestudies.com) and is co-editor for the series, Critical Refugee Studies, at the University of California Press.

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The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate, and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics, and society. In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

The guest speaker for our April program is Heidi Duckler, Founder and Artistic Director of Heidi Duckler Dance in Los Angeles, CA, the pioneer of site-specific place-based contemporary practice. Titled the “reigning queen of site-specific performance” by the LA Times, Duckler has been awarded the Distinguished Dance Alumna award from the University of Oregon School of Music and Dance, the Dance/USA and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation’s Engaging Dance Audiences award, and the National Endowment of the Arts American Masterpiece award. Duckler has created more than 500 dance pieces all over the world and she is currently on faculty at the University of California, Santa Barbara in the Film and Media Studies Department.

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Ghayath Almadhoun formulates his project at the Thomas Mann House as follows: "In my new book of poetry, I will use my writing as a diary to survive, as a therapy to heal the inner wound, and will translate into poetry the reality in which I suddenly find myself. I will search for the origins of my double exile, a stateless child born in Damascus and forced to flee from Syrian exile to a Western one. In this double exile, I will write down the paradox of this new life through mirroring memories. I am no longer Middle Eastern, nor will I ever be 100% Western. I am a new species coming out of exile and living in the parallel. I am becoming the parallel. Berlin is a place where I have my own imaginary Marshall Plan to rebuild Damascus in my imagination.”

Ghayath Almadhoun will present and discuss his work at the University of California, Irvine.

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During her time the Thomas Mann House, Maria Exner will deal with the question of what contribution journalism and media can make to maintaining social cohesion in times of technology-driven polarization of opinion – and what journalistic self-image must underlie this contribution. Taking into account the perspectives of experts in California, the USA, and Germany, generalizable lessons will be drawn and made available to the public and the next generation of journalists. This evening is an opportunity for experts from both sides of the Atlantic and from different professional backgrounds to discuss issues related to journalism, technology and democracy.

Maria Exner studied journalism in Munich. She then trained as a journalist in Berlin and worked as a reporter for the WELT Group. After studying cultural sociology at the London School of Economics, she became the cultural editor at ZEIT ONLINE in 2011. Since 2015, as deputy editor-in-chief she has developed future-oriented magazine journalism and innovative digital projects for ZEIT ONLINE and ZEIT. Since July 2020, Exner has been Deputy Editor in Chief of ZEIT-Magazin. She is founding director of Publix, a new Berlin-based organization with the goal to strengthen independent media and free, critical discourse.

Eryn Brown is a Los Angeles-based editor and writer who joined Zócalo Public Square as an editor-at-large in 2017. A former staff writer at the Los Angeles Times and at Fortune Magazine, she has covered science, health, business, and a variety of other subjects, and has written stories for the New York Times, Wired, Nature, and other outlets. She graduated from Harvard College in 1993. Founded in Los Angeles in 2003, Zócalo Public Square is an ASU Media Enterprise, syndicating journalism to 290 media outlets worldwide.

Colin Maclay is a Research Professor of Communication and the Executive Director of the USC Annenberg Innovation Lab. Situated at the intersections of disciplines, sectors and communities, AnnLab takes a think-and-do approach to exploring the interaction of society’s wicked problems — and opportunities — with media, technology and culture. Colin has long been motivated to understand how radical changes in communications capacity, information generation and processing affect otherwise immutable organizations and institutions, recognizing that humans and organizations are more complex than technology. Ultimately, his work asks what mix of forces will help these emerging technologies and practices to work for – not against – people and society broadly. Previously, he was founding director of the Digital Initiative at the Harvard Business School. He remains a senior researcher and member of the center’s Fellows Advisory Board.  He also spent a decade helping to build, scale and make sustainable Harvard University’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society. Maclay holds a PhD from Northeastern University.

The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

In the Spring of 2017, Steven Lavine stepped down after serving for 29 years as President of the California Institute of the Arts, becoming President Emeritus and an Honorary Doctor of the Arts degree. Shortly thereafter, he was appointed as Founding Director of the Thomas Mann House in Los Angeles.

At CalArts, Lavine oversaw a sustained period of growth in programs, enrollments, reputation, and financial stability. Among his proudest accomplishments at CalArts are the rebuilding of the campus after the devastation of the Northridge Earthquake in 1994; the national and international diversification of the CalArts student body; the building of the Community Arts Partnership; the establishment of REDCAT; and, above all, the maintenance at the center of all CalArts activity of creative and interdisciplinary exploration in the arts. He published two influential co-edited volumes: Exhibiting Cultures: the Poetics and Politics Of Museum Display (1991), and Museums and Communities: the Politics of Public Culture (1993), both published by the Smithsonian Institution.  

Lavine is currently a Board member of the Los Angeles Review of Books, the American University in Rome, and the Cotsen Foundation for the Art of Teaching. He has been honored with the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, and Mexico’s Othli Award.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

The guest speaker for our June program is interdisciplinary artist Cauleen Smith. Raised in Sacramento, California, and now based in Los Angeles, Cauleen Smith is a prolific and critically acclaimed artist specializing in film, installation, and object art. Currently a faculty member at the UCLA School of Arts and Architecture, Smith’s work disrupts traditional representations of image and language, inviting contemplative engagement from her audience. Her work has been showcased in esteemed institutions like The Whitney Museum of American Art, MassMoCA, and LACMA, and she has received numerous awards, including the 2021 Guggenheim Fellowship and the inaugural Ellsworth Kelly Award in 2016. Smith’s innovative practice underscores the transformative potential of art, as she continuously pushes boundaries and invites audiences to consider new perspectives​.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

*Die Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt.*

Berlin, 1943. Martha Liebermann could have never imagined being forced to leave her beloved homeland at the age of 85. As a Jewish woman, however, she is faced with the decision of her life: should the bourgeois widow of the world-famous and highly revered painter Max Liebermann continue to hope for an exit permit from the Nazis, or flee to Switzerland with the help of Hanna Solf and her resistance group? Martha knows that her previous fame and fortune will not protect her from deportation to the concentration camp for much longer. With a heavy heart, she decides to leave her beloved homeland illegally and thus leave her deceased husband’s works to the Nazis.

While Hanna and her friends are preparing to flee, Gestapo commissioner Rudolf Teubner sets a deceitful trap for the Solf group, which also puts Martha’s housekeeper Luise Wagner in serious danger. In order to save Luise and her other helpers, Martha makes an extremely courageous decision…

Journalist Tom Teicholz is joined by Jordanna Gessler, Vice President of Education and Exhibits at Holocaust Museum LA, Professor Helga Schrekenberger, Holocaust scholar and Chair of the German and Russian Department at the University of Vermont, and Dr. Holli Levitsky, Director of Jewish Studies at Loyola Marymount University, in a conversation about the film.

This film is provided by Menemsha Films and directed by Stefan Bühling, with a screenplay from Marco Rossi, and produced by Regina Ziegler and Tillman Geithe. The film will be released in theaters in the US and Canada in early 2024.

*Die Wanderausstellung sowie Veranstaltungen im Rahmen der Ausstellung werden auf Englisch konzipiert. Erfahren Sie mehr zur Ausstellung in deutscher Sprache hier*

The exhibit explores the trajectory of Mann’s political development in relation to different categories such as personal background, Zeitgeist, his poltical commitments, actions and responsibility. Viewers are invited to interrogate their own beliefs and paths alongside those of Thomas Mann. A series of film clips connects these different topics with ongoing debates and critical moments in contemporary history such as the 2017 Charlottesville riot, the Black Lives Matter Movement, climate change mitigation, and the global refugee and immigration crises.

There will be an opening reception on Wednesday, August 23rd at 4:30pm held in Room 150 of the Joseph R. Pearson Hall, located at 1122 West Campus Road, Lawrence KS 66045. Max Kade Center Director Marike Janzen will give opening remarks followed by Brad Allen, the Executive Director of the Lawrence Public Library, who will speak on the role that public libraries and institutions play in local democracy. The event is open to the public. “Although the exhibit channels the intellectual ideas of Thomas Mann, his questions about democracy and democratization are nationally and globally relevant during this historical moment. It is hard to look at the war in Ukraine and not see it as a battleground for democracy too,” said Ani Kokobobo, Professor and Chair of KU’s Department of Slavic, German, and Eurasian Studies.

The Max Kade Center for German-American Studies is part of the Department of Slavic, German, and Eurasian Studies. The Center aims to collaborate with the Kansas University campus and community to promote the teaching and research of German-speaking people in the United States and beyond. The Kansas University Max Kade Center houses significant collections of books, archives, and artworks related to German Americans, including local history of the Lawrence Turnverein.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

At the turn of the century, as camera clubs were springing up across the country, the San Francisco-based California Camera Club was not only the largest in the country. It also had a 14% female membership – twice the national average. Taking the California Camera Club as a point of departure, this talk traces how western clubs served as networks for aspiring female photographers from Los Angeles to Seattle, inspiring many, like Oregon-born Adelaide Hanscom, to claim their legitimate place in the male-dominated camera world and declare “I know what I’m doing.” Amid western photographers celebrating Gold Rush pioneers, monumental landscapes, and industrial extraction, female photographers along the Pacific Coast found ways to shift, and at times disrupt, the common booster rhetoric and shape western American photography in the long term.

A purchase of a ticket is required. Purchase ticket here.

Carolin Görgen is an Associate Professor of American Studies at Sorbonne Université, Paris. After studying American Studies and Art History in the Netherlands, the US, and France, she obtained her PhD from the University Paris-Diderot and the Ecole du Louvre in 2018. Her research focuses on the photographic history of California and the American West. Her work has received support from the Terra Foundation for American Art, the Beinecke Library at Yale, the Huntington Library, and the Amon Carter Museum. She serves on the editorial board of the journal Photographica. Among many other publications, Görgen is the author of the 2021 article “Californian Women Photographers in the U.S. Archival Landscape: Toward a More Inclusive History of American Photography.” She is a 2023 Thomas Mann Fellow.

Carolin Görgen is Associate Professor of American Studies at Sorbonne Université, Paris. After studying American Studies and Art History in the Netherlands, the US, and France, she obtained her PhD from the University Paris-Diderot and the Ecole du Louvre in 2018. Her research focuses on the photographic history of California and the American West. Her work has received support from the Terra Foundation for American Art, the Beinecke Library at Yale, the Huntington Library, and the Amon Carter Museum. She serves on the editorial board of the journal Photographica. Among many other publications, Görgen is the author of the 2021 article “Californian Women Photographers in the U.S. Archival Landscape: Toward a More Inclusive History of American Photography.” She is a 2023 Thomas Mann Fellow.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

RSVP Here

This event will take place online and is open to the public.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The heated debate around documenta fifteen in Kassel, 2022, brought to the fore questions about the function and value of aesthetics. Given that art is deeply entrenched within structures of capitalism and neo-colonialism, the political, social and economic role of art, artistic practices, and art institutions in current conditions of global inequality remains ambivalent and controversial. How do we synchronize in a globalized world the opposing and equally legitimate claims of conflicting memories? Might critical artistic practices facilitate transnational justice and democracy, protecting and promoting human rights? Can art make us political and ethical by provoking us out of our indifference and irresponsibility? Or to the contrary – should art be autonomous and non-purposive and not be placed in the service of political and ethical imperatives? Can the political labor of training the imagination mitigate imperialist, antisemitic, neo-colonist, racist, orientalist and heteronormative structures and practices?

María do Mar Castro Varela studied psychology and pedagogy at the University of Cologne and earned her doctorate in political science at the Justus Liebig University Giessen. She is a professor of general education and social work with a focus on gender and queer at the Alice Salomon University of Applied Science in Berlin. Her research focus on social justice, digital hate and conspiracy theories, and issues of emancipation.

Nikita Dhawan studied German Studies, Philosophy und Gender Studies at Mumbai University and Ruhr-University Bochum. She holds the Chair in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the Technical University Dresden. Her research and teaching focuses on global justice, human rights, democracy and decolonization.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

In times of multiple crises, it is imperative to (re)examine the mandate of art. What role should art play in the face of rising social injustices? Could critical artistic practices facilitate transnational justice and democracy, protecting and promoting human rights? Or should art remain non-purposive? Given that art functions within structures of capitalism and coloniality, the role of art and art institutions is ambivalent. Can the political labor of training the imagination mitigate unjust structures and practices?

To find answers to these pressing questions, Nikita Dhawan and Maria do Mar Castro Varela, presently fellows at the Thomas Mann House in L.A., discuss with installation and performance artist Tania Bruguera if and how an aesthetic education can help us imagine a planetary future.

María do Mar Castro Varela studied psychology and pedagogy at the University of Cologne and earned her doctorate in political science at the Justus Liebig University Giessen. She is a professor of general education and social work with a focus on gender and queer at the Alice Salomon University of Applied Science in Berlin. Her research focus on social justice, digital hate and conspiracy theories, and issues of emancipation.

Nikita Dhawan studied German Studies, Philosophy und Gender Studies at Mumbai University and Ruhr-University Bochum. She holds the Chair in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the Technical University Dresden. Her research and teaching focuses on global justice, human rights, democracy and decolonization.

Tania Bruguera is a research and performance artist who earned her MFA in performance from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is the founder and director of Cátedra Arte de Conducta (Behavior Art School), the first performance studies program in Latin America. Bruguera’s work is in the permanent collections of many institutions around the world, including the Bronx Museum of the Arts, the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes de La Habana, and the Museum of Modern Art, in New York.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

In her book Learning from the Germans: Race and the Memory of Evil, Susan Neiman argues that Germany is exemplary in how a country can come to terms with its historical wrongdoings. Tracing the long and difficult path Germans faced in their effort to atone for the crimes of the Holocaust, Neiman outlines how progress is evident in laws, in language and in the education system. However, a number of controversies in the past years over Germany’s colonial past indicate the pitfalls of German Vergangenheitsaufarbeitung (working through the past). These controversies confront us with the challenge of how to think together different forms of discrimination and memorialization. The event addresses the conundrums of memory politics and engages with the “unfinished conversations” between Holocaust and Postcolonial Studies.

María do Mar Castro Varela is Professor of Pedagogy and Social Work at the Alice Salomon University in Berlin. Her research interests include Postcolonial Theory, Gender and Queer Studies, social justice, digital hate, and emancipation. Selected Publications: Untimely Utopias. Migrant Women between Learned Hope and Self-Invention; Postcolonial Theory. A Critical Introduction (co-authored); Post/Pandemic Lives. A New Theory of Fragility (co-authored) [all published in German]. In 2020 she was awarded the Sir Peter Ustinov Guest Professorship at the Institute for Contemporary History, University of Vienna, and in 2023 the Thomas Mann Fellowship. María do Mar Castro Varela is the founder of the bildungsLab* (www.bildungslab.net) and Chair of the Institute for Contrapuntual Social Analysis.

Nikita Dhawan holds the Chair in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the Technical University Dresden. Her research and teaching focuses on global justice, human rights, democracy and decolonization. She received the Käthe Leichter Award in 2017 for outstanding achievements in the pursuit of women’s and gender studies and in support of the women’s movement and the achievement of gender equality. Selected publications include: Impossible Speech: On the Politics of Silence and Violence (2007); Decolonizing Enlightenment: Transnational Justice, Human Rights and Democracy in a Postcolonial World (ed., 2014); Reimagining the State: Theoretical Challenges and Transformative Possibilities (ed., 2019); Rescuing the Enlightenment from the Europeans: Critical Theories of Decolonization (forthcoming). In 2023, she was awarded the Gerda-Henkel-Visiting Professorship at Stanford University and the Thomas Mann Fellowship.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The program will start with a talk The Archive Onscreen: Reflections on History "In Search of Bengali Harlem" by Associate Professor of Comparative Media Studies and Writing at MIT Vivek Bald. The lecture will be followed by 2023 Thomas Mann Fellow María do Mar Castro Varela, remarks, Emancipation (Re-)Considered: Aesthetic Education and the Aesthetics of Education. After her talk and a provided lunch, 2023 Thomas Mann Fellow, Nikita Dhawan will discuss the Aesthetic Enlightenment and the Art of Decolonization. Nikita's contributions will be followed with a talk by Helen Yitah, who is a professor of English at the University of Ghana-Legon's. Her lecture Singing [In]elegance: A Critique of Tradition and Custom in African Women's Songs will be accompanied by Hortense Spillers, professor at Vanderbilt University's Up Close and Personal: The Space of the Aesthetic. After a coffee break Emily Apter, Silver Professor of French and Comparative Literature from New York University will bring all the participants together for a discussion.

María do Mar Castro Varela studied psychology and pedagogy at the University of Cologne and earned her doctorate in political science at the Justus Liebig University Giessen. She is a professor of general education and social work with a focus on gender and queer at the Alice Salomon University of Applied Science in Berlin. Her research focus on social justice, digital hate and conspiracy theories, and issues of emancipation.

Nikita Dhawan studied German Studies, Philosophy und Gender Studies at Mumbai University and Ruhr-University Bochum. She holds the Chair in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the Technical University Dresden. Her research and teaching focuses on global justice, human rights, democracy and decolonization.

Emily Apter is an American academic, translator, editor and professor. Her areas of research are translation theory, language philosophy, political theory, critical theory, continental philosophy, history and theory of comparative literature, psychoanalysis, and political fiction. She is currently Silver Professor of French and Comparative Literature and Chair of the Department of French Literature, Thought and Culture at New York University.

Vivek Bald is a scholar, writer, and documentary filmmaker whose work focuses on histories of migration and diaspora, particularly from the South Asian subcontinent. He is also Associate Professor of Comparative Media Studies and Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Hortense J. Spillers is an American literary critic, Black Feminist scholar and the Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor at Vanderbilt University. A scholar of the African diaspora, Spillers is known for her essays on African-American literature, collected in Black, White, and In Color: Essays on American Literature and Culture, published by the University of Chicago Press in 2003, and Comparative American Identities: Race, Sex, and Nationality in the Modern Text, a collection edited by Spillers published by Routledge in 1991.

Helen Yitah is a Professor in English, University of Ghana. She teaches Introductory Courses in Composition and Literary Studies. Her higher level teaching is in the areas of the New Literatures in English, Eighteenth Century British Literature, The Short Story, Practice in Criticism, Literary Theory, American literature and Research Methods. Her scholarly articles have appeared in many local and international peer reviewed journals.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

In times of multiple crises, it is imperative to (re)examine the mandate of art. What role should art play in the face of rising social injustices? Could critical artistic practices facilitate transnational justice and democracy, protecting and promoting human rights? Or should art remain non-purposive (or, unzweckmäßig, as phrased by Kant and Adorno)? Given that art functions within structures of capitalism and coloniality, the role of art and art institutions is ambivalent. Can the political labor of training the imagination mitigate unjust structures and practices? To find answers to this pressing question we (a) look into artivism, whose origins lie in the social movements of the 1970s and 1980s in Los Angeles and Berlin and (b) examine if and how an aesthetic education can help us imagine a planetary future.

María do Mar Castro Varela studied psychology and pedagogy at the University of Cologne and earned her doctorate in political science at the Justus Liebig University Giessen. She is a professor of general education and social work with a focus on gender and queer at the Alice Salomon University of Applied Science in Berlin. Her research focus on social justice, digital hate and conspiracy theories, and issues of emancipation.

Nikita Dhawan studied German Studies, Philosophy und Gender Studies at Mumbai University and Ruhr-University Bochum. She holds the Chair in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the Technical University Dresden. Her research and teaching focuses on global justice, human rights, democracy and decolonization.

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak is an Indian scholar, literary theorist, and feminist critic. She is a University Professor at Columbia University and a founding member of the establishment's Institute for Comparative Literature and Society. Considered one of the most influential postcolonial intellectuals, Spivak is best known for her essay "Can the Subaltern Speak?" and her translation of and introduction to Jacques Derrida's De la grammatologie.

In these tumultuous times, it becomes imperative to reassess the role that art plays in our society. This discussion will explore questions such as: How can art address the pressing issues of social injustice? Can critical artistic practices promote transnational justice, democracy, human rights, and environmental justice? Should art maintain its non-purposive nature, as advocated by philosophers like Kant and Adorno? Given that art exists within structures of capitalism and colonialism, how can it navigate its ambivalent position? Can the imaginative power of art be harnessed to challenge imperialist, racist, orientalist, and heteronormative structures? Furthermore, how can artivism inspire us to envision a more inclusive and just planetary future?

Don't miss this opportunity to engage in a profound exploration of art's role in shaping our world. Reserve your spot today, and be part of the conversation that could redefine the political mandate of art in our society.

Afterward, you're invited to continue the conversation during a reception, where you can enjoy refreshments and network with fellow attendees.

The Round Table Discussion will be moderated by Mia Matthias, Assistant Curator, Glenstone Museum.

María do Mar Castro Varela studied psychology and pedagogy at the University of Cologne and earned her doctorate in political science at the Justus Liebig University Giessen. She is a professor of general education and social work with a focus on gender and queer at the Alice Salomon University of Applied Science in Berlin. Her research focus on social justice, digital hate and conspiracy theories, and issues of emancipation.

Nikita Dhawan studied German Studies, Philosophy und Gender Studies at Mumbai University and Ruhr-University Bochum. She holds the Chair in Political Theory and History of Ideas at the Technical University Dresden. Her research and teaching focuses on global justice, human rights, democracy and decolonization.

Nehemiah Dixon III adds his voice and experience to the Art Works Environmental Public Art Project team advocating for social justice through his artwork, community involvement and teaching. As a native of Washington D.C. he believes that art should be experienced through any means necessary which drives him to create art for public places.

Reginald L. Douglas is a DC-based director, producer, and new play advocate dedicated to creating theater that connects audiences of diverse backgrounds and perspectives. Throughout his career and as the Artistic Director of Mosaic Theater Company he has created and produced theater that catalyzes conversation, social change, and community building.

Maria Manuela Goyanes is a first-generation Latina theatre maker, known for her work at The Public Theatre in New York City, as well as her September 2018 appointment as the artistic director of Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington D.C. She received the Josephine Abady Award in 2007 from the League of Professional Theatre Women for her work on "cultural diversity" in theatre. In 2015, she became a member of the National Alliance for Musical Theatre. She also teaches and lectures at various universities.

Renee K. Harrison is a tenured Associate Professor of African American and US Religious History at Howard University. She earned her Ph.D. in Religion from Emory University (Atlanta, GA) with an interdisciplinary concentration in History, Philosophy, African American Studies, and Black Feminist/Womanist Thought. Her research interests include an interdisciplinary and interfaith approach to African American religious history and culture; Black feminist/womanist thought; aesthetic theory and the arts; phenomenology; and rituals of healing and resistance.

Maria del Carmen Montoya is an American artist working in participatory art, sculpture and new media. Her work is inherently collaborative and collective. In 2009, Montoya became a core member of Ghana Think Tank, an international artist collective that "develops the first world" by flipping traditional power dynamics, asking people living in the "third world" to intervene into the lives of the people living in the so-called "developed" world. Montoya is an assistant professor in sculpture and spatial practices at the Corcoran School of Art and Design at George Washington University.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The freedom of art is one of the imperatives of every democracy. But does this freedom make art inconsequential? Does art have a role in addressing social issues, promoting social justice, or in defending democracy when it comes under pressure? In short: does art have a political mandate and what is the role of art in weakened democracies?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

The guest speaker for our October program is Chinese-Vietnamese-American Los Angeles- based Emmy award-winning producer Elizabeth Ai. She writes, directs, and produces independent narratives as well as branded content for companies such as National Geographic, ESPN, and VICE. She is currently directing and producing two in-progress feature documentaries. She’s a fellow of Berlin Talent Campus, Film Independent, Sundance, and Tribeca. Her film projects are supported by California Humanities, Firelight Media, Knight Foundation, and ITVS.

*Die Ausstellung ist auf englischer Sprache konzipiert*

“It is a terrible spectacle when the irrational becomes popular,” said Thomas Mann in his famous speech at the Library of Congress in 1943. The resistance of this famous German author is both inspiring and, alas, deeply relevant today, as we witness the fundamental values of democracy once again being called into question by an increasingly virulent populism and nationalism on both sides of the Atlantic that are putting democratic society under massive pressure.

As a polemical contribution to these current debates, the Princeton German Department is hosting the touring exhibition Thomas Mann: Democracy Will Win! whose spatial and metaphorical center is the Thomas Mann House in Pacific Palisades, California. For it was from this sanctuary in exile that Mann campaigned tirelessly for a new understanding of democracy. Today, Mann’s West Coast residence is once again at the service of intellectual exchange and transatlantic understanding.

The exhibition is structured around the terms Beginnings, Zeitgeist, Affirmation, Take Action, and Responsibility which convey some of the ambivalences that even a democratic system cannot eliminate. Thomas Mann’s life offers numerous points of departure for examining the current state, the fragility, and the future of democracy – inspired by Mann’s dictum: “DEMOCRACY WILL WIN!”

The exhibition, which is free and open to the public, will be on view November 6-28 in the Lower Hyphen of the East Pyne Building on the Princeton University Campus.

Visit Princeton's event page to learn more.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics and society.

In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis; on what social issues they can give new impulses; how they can help shape local communities; and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

RSVP here

Pease note that the November edition of The Political Mandate of the Arts is an onsite program at the Wende Museum.

The guest speaker is the Wende’s chief curator and director of programming since 2014, Joes Segal, who will discuss the politics of curating, specifically highlighting the new exhibition Visions of Transcendence: Creating Space in East and West. Segal is an art historian and historian who has published about Cold War cultural history, German cultural history, and art and politics since the twentieth century.

Frances Anderton is the author of Common Ground: Multifamily Housing in Los Angeles, published by Angel City Press. She co-produced 40 Years of Building Community, a short film about the nonprofit housing developer Community Corporation of Santa Monica, and recently published a research paper on “Awesome and Affordable” housing as a Fellow of Friends of Residential Treasures: Los Angeles (FORT: LA). She contributes reporting on design and architecture to KCRW public radio station, for which she previously hosted the show DnA: Design and Architecture, and produced the current affairs shows Which Way, LA? and To The Point. Honors include the 2010 Esther McCoy Award, from the Architectural Guild of USC School of Architecture, where she currently teaches. Common Ground garnered a Gold award for best Regional Nonfiction from Foreword Reviews.

Lauren Bon is an environmental artist from Los Angeles. Her practice, Metabolic Studio, explores self-sustaining and self-diversifying systems of exchange that feed emergent properties that regenerate the life web. Some of her works include: Not A Cornfield, which transformed and revived an industrial brownfield in Downtown L.A. into a thirty-two-acre cornfield for one agricultural cycle; 100 Mules Walking the Los Angeles Aqueduct, a 240-mile performative action that aimed to reconnect the city of Los Angeles with the source of its water for the centenary of the opening of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. Her studio’s current work, Bending the River, aims to utilize L.A.’s first private water right to deliver 106-acre feet of water annually from the L.A. River to over 50 acres of land in the historic core of Downtown.

Norman Klein is a critic, urban and media historian and novelist. His books include: The History of Forgetting: Los Angeles and the Erasure of Memory; Seven Minutes: The Life and Death of the American Animated Cartoon; The Vatican to Vegas: The History of Special Effects; Freud in Coney Island and Other Tales; and the database novel Bleeding Through: Layers of Los Angeles, 1920-86. He is currently completing an interactive historical science fiction novel titled The Imaginary Twentieth Century. His essays have appeared in anthologies, museum catalogs, newspapers, scholarly journals and on the web. His work (including museum shows) has centered on the relationship between collective memory and power in urban spaces; the thin line between fact and fiction; and erasure, forgetting, scripted spaces and the social imaginary.

Mimi Zeiger is a Los Angeles-based critic, editor, and curator. She was co-curator of the U.S. Pavilion for the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale and co-curator of the 2020-2021 Exhibit Columbus entitled New Middles: From Main Street to Megalopolis, What is the Future of the Middle City? She has written for the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Architectural Review, Metropolis, and Architect. She is an opinion columnist for Dezeen and former West Coast Editor of The Architects Newspaper. Zeiger is the 2015 recipient of the Bradford Williams Medal for excellence in writing about landscape architecture, where she is books editor.

*Diese Veranstaltung findet in englischer Sprache statt*

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse high school, undergraduate, and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art, culture, politics, and society. In conversation with visual artists, musicians, dancers, writers, theater and filmmakers, cultural critics, curators, and others, the students will explore how the arts can make a difference in times of social and political crisis, on what social issues they can give new impulses, how they can help shape local communities, and how the alleged freedom and autonomy of the arts might impede or help the arts in terms of social and political significance.

Myriam Boulos was born in 1992 in Lebanon. At the age of sixteen, she started to use her camera to get closer to reality. She graduated with a master’s degree in photography from the Lebanese Academy of Fine Arts in 2015. She has taken part in both national and international collective exhibitions, including Close Enough at ICP, NY; Infinite Identities at Huis Marseille, Amsterdam; and Troisième Biennale des Photographes du Monde Arabe, at l’Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris. Her work has been published in Aperture, FOAM, Time, GQ Middle East, Vogue Arabia, and Vanity Fair France, among other publications. In 2020 Myriam co-founded and became the photo editor of Al Hayya, a bilingual magazine that publishes literary and visual content on the works, interests and strife of women in her region. In 2021 she joined Magnum as a nominee. Her book, What’s ours, was published in November 2023 by Aperture.